Rohto Pharmaceutical: Japanese pharmacy company launches Southeast Asian expansion

Rohto Pharmaceutical: Japanese pharmacy company launches Southeast Asian expansion

HO CHI MINH — Japanese skin care company Rohto Pharmaceutical is going into expansion mode in Southeast Asia. It plans to open directly run stores and develop products that cater to the needs of consumers in each market.

     The Osaka-based company currently runs two stores in Vietnam. It plans to increase the number to 20 by fiscal 2018 and also expects to run shops in Myanmar and Cambodia.

     Rohto will work with a Vietnamese company to help it expand in that country. It plans to open its shops in large supermarkets in Ho Chi Minh City, in southern Vietnam, as well as in Hanoi, the country’s capital.

     The company will train female store clerks so that they can offer various services, such as simple make-up sessions.

     Until now, the company’s products have been sold mainly in privately run drug stores in Vietnam. Rohto executives decided on the new approach because big global players like Unilever are now moving into the market.

     Rohto forayed into Vietnam in 1996 and now sells a range of products, from eye drops to cosmetics to drugs. The company has a factory in the country and generates sales of about $166 million a year in Southeast Asia.

Rohto Pharmaceutical: Japanese pharmacy company launches Southeast Asian expansion